A Norfolk MP has demanded urgent talks with the owners of Oyster Yachts after the shock news that the company is facing liquidation.

The boat-builder told staff on Monday that it had “run out of cash” to pay them and that the company was stopped trading immediately to avoid incurring further losses.

READ MORE: Oyster Yachts staff ‘sent home after company runs out of cash’North Norfolk MP Norman Lamb, into whose constituency the company’s Wroxham site falls, said he would be writing to Dutch owners HTP Investments to urge them to reconsider the decision, which could leave the company’s 400 UK workers out of a job.

“I express my enormous sympathy to all the workforce affected by this dreadful news,” he said.

“I will be contacting the North Norfolk District Council chief executive to make sure redundancy and employment support for staff is coordinated as a matter of urgency.

“I will also be writing to HTP Investments BV asking them to reconsider this devastating decision at a time when the business appears to have a full order book. I want to meet with them.

“It is shocking that the company appears to be abandoning hundreds of employees, especially when the decision is completely out of the blue. The critical question is why are they doing this when there is a full and vibrant order book?”

Oyster Yachts announced just last month that it had a “record” order book of £80m as it headed into 2018.

On January 10, chief executive David Tydeman said: “We closed the year with an £80m+ order-book of 25 yachts ranging from Oyster 475-07 to 118-02, securing a positive outlook for 2018 and 2019.”

But staff were given letters on Monday, signed by general manager Ben Collett, saying that the company faced “entering into an insolvency procedure imminently”.